Hilary Benn MP, Labour’s Shadow Foreign Secretary, responding to David Cameron accepting that it may not be possible to change the EU’s treaties before the EU referendum, said:

“All year the Prime Minister has been saying that change to the treaty was a definite requirement and yet now, faced with entirely predictable opposition from other member states, he is signalling retreat while pretending that all he ever wanted was a post-dated cheque.

“The Prime Minister has made a mess of this. He should have known what the position of other countries would be, but because he did not prepare the ground, for the second time in a few months he has been forced to admit that he can’t get what he wants.

“The same pattern repeats itself over and over again with the Prime Minister and Europe. He marches his troops up to the top of the hill and then he has to march them down again. He is so intent on keeping his Eurosceptic backbenchers at bay, that a calm negotiation of what is in the country’s interests  - remaining a member of the European Union - comes second.“